Improvement in processes of preserving food



DAVID SNEDEKER, OF JERSEY CITY, NEW JERSEY, ASSIGNOR OF ONE- THIBD HISRIGHT TO P. G. SGHUYLER, OF NEW YORK, N. Y.

IMPROVEMENT IN PROCESSES OF PRESERVING FOOD.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 161,072, dated March23, 1875; application filed February 23, 1875.

heat, as, for example, in a brazier, or upon a hot surface of any kind,such treatment of the substances aforesaid, being subsequent to, anddistinct from, their impregnation with the sulphurous fumes. My saidinvention may be employed in the deodorization of fruits and otherorganic substances prepared for preservation by subjection tosulphurous-acid gas, or it may be applied in removing or neutralizingsuch gas from the atmosphere of apartments that, as in match-factoriesand the like, are, of necessity, more or less filled with said gas,hitherto frequently to an inconvenient and deleterious degree.

In the practice of my invention it is simply necessary to place thesubstance, previously impregnated with sulphurous acid, in a closedchamber, and to burn Within the said chamber, in a brazier or upon aheated surface, a quantity of sugar or saccharine matter, which, beingfirst converted into caramel and subsequently dissipated in vapor, willbe found to cause the disa mearance from the substance treated of thecharacteristic odor and taste of sulphurous acid. When the substance isa solid, it may be suspended in the closed chamber with a liquid. Thelatter may be caused to pass in a thin sheet or sheets over suitablesurfaces exposed to the vapor from the burning sugar or saccharinematter, or by any of the means ordinarily employed for the exposure of alarge surface of liquid to the action of air or other gaseous body, thevapor from the sugar, in such case, of course occupying the place of theair in the application of such apparatus, in the carrying into practiceof myimprovement. When the substance to be treated is of an aeriformcharacter, such as the atmosphere within a workshop, factory, or otherbuilding where sulphur fumes are generated or admitted, it is simplynecessary to burn the sugar or other saccharine matter upon a hotsurface in such position within the building that its vapors will passto all parts thereof, and thoroughly permeate the contained atmosphere,the odor of sulphurous-acid gas with which the latter is impregnatedbeing neutralized or destroyed by the action of the vapors generatedfrom the sugar during its combustion, as described.

In order to carry my said invention into effect for deodorizing theaeriform contents of a room, apartment, or the like, charged with thesulphurous gas, it is not necessary that the combustion of the sugarshould take place in the room itself, as with an ordinary brazier, butit may be burned in a furnace or apparatus external to the room, and theresultant vapor conducted to the room, 860., by a pipe or other suitableconduit.

1 do not herein claim the treatment of substances by the simultaueousand combined action of the fumes of sulphur and the vapors generated bythe combustion of'sugar, as this is secured to me by Letters Patent No.157,107, issued to me on the 24th day of November, 1874,; but

What I claim as new, and as the subjectmatter of this specification, is-

The process herein described of deodorizing solid, liquid, or aeriformsubstances from the fumes of sulphur by subjecting them to the action ofthe vapors generated from burning sugar or other saccharine mattersubsequent to their impregnation with the sulphurous fumes,substantially as herein set forth.

' DAVID SNEDEKER.

Witnesses JAMES A. WHITNEY, ADOLPH NIooLLET.

